


Tongue Tied

by silver_etoile



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-25 17:03:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17729240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silver_etoile/pseuds/silver_etoile
Summary: Lucas' 'little problem' with Eliott (mainly the fact that he can't seem to form coherent sentences around him) doesn't seem to be getting any better and Eliott's getting tired of it.Continuation ofInarticulate.





	Tongue Tied

**Author's Note:**

> Someone on tumblr asked for a continuation. It's basically all a giant AU now that clips have dropped.

Lucas had to get over this. He had to get over this problem he had.

It wasn’t exactly a problem. More like a conundrum. And that conundrum was Eliott. Or rather the fact that his knees got weak every time Eliott smiled at him, the fact that he could barely string two words together when they spoke, the fact that all of Lucas’ other friends had no problem talking to Eliott, welcoming him into the group as if he’d always been there.

He had tried. Lucas had tried to talk to Eliott, to be a normal person and make conversation, especially after Yann had pointed out that he never did. Having Yann suspect was the last thing he wanted.

Still, he knew Eliott’s eyes lingered on him when he didn’t speak to him during lunch, when he opted to roll his eyes at Basile instead. It made him nervous in a way he’d never been before. No girl had ever made him feel this way, like every time they accidentally touched shot electricity through his skin.

He secretly liked it, though, liked the way Eliott made him feel, caught somewhere between nervous and excited, as if at any moment, he might blurt out that he had a huge crush on him. That wouldn’t be good, though, to say it, admit it, because Eliott was just a friend. Not even a friend because Lucas couldn’t quite bring himself to be as friendly as the others.

Even though Lucas couldn’t behave normally around Eliott, that didn’t stop him from making it a point to show up early to school, earlier than the others, just so he could have a few minutes alone with Eliott, whether they spoke or not.

“ _Salut_ ,” he greeted Eliott at the gate, at least able to get one word out.

Eliott glanced at him, not quite flashing his usual smile, and Lucas found himself frowning. Usually, it was Eliott’s smile that forced his tongue into a ball, unable to come up with any coherent sentences. Today, it wasn’t quite there.

“Hey.”

Taking a breath, Lucas stepped up to him, glancing around, but there weren’t many people there yet, inside. For a moment, the silence fell between them, and Eliott didn’t fill it for once, watching Lucas swallow down the nerves rising in his throat.

He couldn’t always think around Eliott, as if something about his presence shut down all rational thoughts in his brain, and all he could think about was how soft Eliott’s lips looked, how his eyes turned grey in certain light, how his hair was wild but perfectly styled at the same time.

He shouldn’t have been thinking of those things.

Shoving his hands in his pockets, he sniffed against the cold, wracking his brain for something to say.

“How, uh, how’s L going?” he asked finally and Eliott’s eyes flicked to him. His shoulders were scrunched, and Lucas wasn’t sure if it was because of the cold or something else.

“It’s fine,” Eliott said with a shrug. “I know you Science students think it’s a waste of time.”

“No,” Lucas said quickly, shaking his head. “Someone’s gotta do it. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have television or books or…” He trailed off, heart jumping as Eliott smiled for the first time that morning.

“So we’re just there to entertain you?” Eliott asked, and Lucas wasn’t sure if he was teasing or not.

“Euh,” he said slowly, biting his lower lip. “No?”

Eliott’s gaze was piercing, and Lucas felt the back of his neck heating up, and he had to look away. When he looked back, Eliott was staring into the yard, the hunch back in his shoulders.

Lucas was terrible at this, he decided, as he watched Eliott pull out his phone instead. They shouldn’t have been standing there surrounded by an awkward silence. Eliott should have been smiling and Lucas should have felt something other than annoyance at himself.

“There are the guys,” Eliott said before Lucas could get his mind together. Disappointed somehow, he turned to where Yann and Arthur were approaching.

“Since when do you like school enough to be early?” Yann asked as he greeted Lucas with a nod.

“Probably trying to suck up to Mme Rigaux,” Arthur added unhelpfully, and Lucas rolled his eyes, looking away from Eliott. “He’s got a little crush, you know?”

“I do not,” Lucas argued, glancing at Eliott, checking his reaction, if he seemed to care.

It didn’t matter, he told himself firmly as Eliott didn’t react except to pocket his phone finally. It didn’t matter that Eliott didn’t react. They were only supposed to be friends and they were barely that.

“Well, you’re not hooking up with Chloé,” Arthur pointed out, as if Lucas cared anything about Chloé. “So who do you like?”

Usually, Lucas could deflect the question, point out some girl, but his mind went blank as Arthur asked the question. Instead, his gaze fell on Eliott as he cast around for an answer that would satisfy Arthur. Eliott was watching him now, as if just as interested.

“I…” he started to say, trying not to listen to his brain saying, _Eliott! You like Eliott!_.

“Guys!” He was saved, for once in his life, by the arrival of Basile. “You’ll never believe what happened!”

“You finally saw a girl naked?” Yann asked and Arthur scoffed. 

“Don’t give him that much credit,” he said, and Basile didn’t seem affected by it at all.

Lucas was barely paying attention, feeling his heart beating a tattoo against his throat as he let out a breath, relieved at the interruption. He couldn’t help glancing at Eliott, and he found him watching, as he always seemed to be. It didn’t make much sense, why Eliott wanted to be friends with them, why he didn’t try to make friends with people in his year, in his subjects.

“I texted Daphné and she messaged me back!” Basile said excitedly.

“What’d she say?”

“She said, ‘how did you get my number?’” he said, and Arthur and Yann laughed, shaking their heads. Lucas couldn’t find it in himself to be amused by Basile’s failure at flirting with Daphné. He had his own failure to deal with, like the fact that Eliott probably thought he was a gigantic asshole for never talking to him, for tripping over his own words every time he did.

“You’re pathetic,” Arthur told Basile as they finally entered through the gate to the courtyard. Lucas dragged behind, feeling like an idiot. He was going to ruin this before it even started.

*

Lucas was actually glad Arthur was sitting with Alexia in class, although he wasn’t too sure he appreciated Imane’s brand of honesty when she told him his answers were wrong all the time.

At least he didn’t have to listen to Arthur tease him about a nonexistent crush on his teacher.

“Are you sure you even have a brain?” Imane asked as she crossed out his answer.

“Hey!” he protested. “That’s not wrong.”

“Well, it’s not right,” she replied, and he rolled his eyes.

“Do you have to be so mean all the time?” he asked as she wrote in a different answer. She shot him a look over the paper.

“Being right is not being mean.”

“You could be nicer about being right,” he shot back. He was already in a bad mood after this morning with Eliott and Arthur. How was he supposed to be friends with Eliott when he couldn’t even talk to him? What’s more, he didn’t even _want_ to be friends. He wanted to be so much more than that.

He didn’t know if Eliott felt the same, and it was a dangerous thing to think about when his friends expected him to hook up with girls, expected him to be able to be a player like them. Or well, like Yann. Arthur and Basile didn’t seem to have much game.

Imane set down her pencil, turning to him, and he didn’t feel reassured.

“Okay,” she said, a tight smile at her lips. “Lucas, sometimes people are wrong about cell division, and it’s up to those who know better to tell them the truth because the truth is always better than letting people believe a lie. Do you understand?”

Lucas paused. He knew she was just being sarcastic, but something she said made him stop. “Even if the truth could hurt you?”

Imane frowned. “What could hurt you about cell division?”

“Never mind,” he muttered, turning back to his textbook and letting her write in her answer.

He couldn’t tell Eliott the truth, that just looking at him made his heart beat faster, made his palms sweaty, stomach flip-flopping for no reason like he was on a roller coaster. If he told Eliott, then he would know, and Lucas couldn’t. He couldn’t expose himself like that. What if Eliott didn’t feel the same? What if he told everyone? It was too risky.

Lucas didn’t pay attention the rest of class, letting Imane answer how she liked and scribbling his name on the paper at the end.

*

Lucas wasn’t interested. He wasn’t interested in Basile’s plan to get Daphné to fall for him. He wasn’t interested in Arthur’s marked confidence that it wouldn’t work. He wasn’t even interested in his own fries on his plate.

He was too busy sneaking glances at Eliott across the table, how Eliott was engaging in the conversation, as though he didn’t get all tongue-tied simply by being in Lucas’ presence.

“Are you okay?” Yann asked as Lucas pushed at his fries, lowering his voice and muttering it into his ear.

“Fine,” Lucas said, jerking his shoulder, plastering on a smile.

“Is everything okay with your mom?” Yann asked, sounding concerned, but Lucas didn’t want him concerned. He didn’t want Yann to think anything was wrong because nothing was wrong. Nothing was wrong. He didn’t have an overwhelming crush on Eliott, to the point he turned into a complete asshole.

“She’s fine,” he assured Yann, flicking a fry at him. “I’m just stressed about school and Mika doesn’t know how to knock which can make for awkward conversations.”

“Don’t need to know,” Yann replied, backing off, but he grinned at Lucas, and Lucas felt a little better. At least Yann believed him.

Looking up, Lucas caught Eliott watching him again, clear blue eyes resting on his face as though trying to figure something out. It made his heart beat faster, nervous again, like he always was around Eliott.

“I, uh,” Lucas said, tearing his gaze from Eliott, interrupting Arthur and Basile’s conversation. “I have to go meet Imane. We didn’t finish our assignment.”

“You’re ditching us for Imane?” Arthur asked, eyebrows as high as they could go.

“Sorry,” Lucas only said, grabbing his bag. He was pretty sure Imane wasn’t in the canteen, so maybe they wouldn’t know he just couldn’t stand to sit across from Eliott anymore and his intense gaze that made him feel things all the way down to his toes, things he’d never actually get to act on, and it tugged at his heart in a disappointing sort of way.

He left the boys behind at the table, not sure where he was going as he crossed the courtyard. There was nowhere to go, really, except one place. The foyer.

Lucas had never thought he’d be reduced to being one of those kids, stepping into the empty classroom at lunchtime. He was glad it was empty as he dumped his bag on the floor and slumped down in a chair. At least that meant there was no one to see how pathetic he was.

Setting his elbows on his knees, he pressed his hands to his face with a groan. What was he supposed to do? He had to be friends with Eliott, but he could barely form words around him, barely bring himself to be anything but standoffish, worried someone might figure out that he didn’t dislike Eliott. No, in fact, it was the exact opposite.

“You seem to be missing your other half.”

Lucas’ head shot up at Eliott’s voice in the doorway, eyes going wide, heart climbing into his throat.

“What-what are you doing here?” he stuttered, rising from the chair as Eliott came inside and the door swung shut behind him.

For a second, Eliott didn’t reply, gazing around the room at Daphné’s attempt to make it a “cool” place to be. Lucas still wouldn’t call it that, but there were at least chairs to sit in where he could wallow in his inability to be a normal human being.

Finally, Eliott seemed to sigh, coming to face Lucas, no smile on his face this time.

“Do you hate me, Lucas?”

Lucas’ eyes widened and he shook his head quickly. “What? No.”

Eliott paused, running his tongue over his bottom lip slowly, as though he didn’t quite believe him. “Because you hardly talk to me. You always have an excuse to leave when I’m around. You always seem really nervous.”

That was because he was nervous. Eliott made him think of things he shouldn’t, like fingers grasping bedsheets, gasps in dark rooms, skin on skin contact that made him flush just thinking about it.

Swallowing, he wasn’t sure what to say, chancing a glance up at Eliott, at Eliott’s frown.

He wanted to tell him. Lucas wanted to say everything he’d been thinking for the past few weeks, that even looking at Eliott made him melt, excited and scared at the same time because he knew it couldn’t happen, wouldn’t happen.

“I don’t hate you,” he managed to say instead, forcing himself not to let his eyes linger on Eliott’s lips. That would surely give himself away.

“Then why don’t you talk to me?” Eliott asked, sounding confused, confused and sad.

“Because you make me nervous,” Lucas said before he could stop himself, clenching his fists, fingernails digging into his palms as he immediately regretted it despite Eliott’s frown.

“I make you nervous?” he repeated, eyebrows furrowing as he took a step forward. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know,” Lucas said, breathing harder, as though he couldn’t quite get enough air. “You just do.”

He kept his head down, staring at the dirty floor, willing himself to calm down. He couldn’t say any more. Any more and Eliott would figure it out. It was hard enough, pretending to be interested in girls, pretending to care what Yann or Arthur or Basile said about them. Pretending that he didn’t want to pull Eliott to his lips and kiss him, that he didn’t think about it all the time, what it might be like to kiss a boy, to kiss Eliott.

“Lucas.” Eliott was much closer now as Lucas looked up. Eliott smiled, just a tiny bit. “You make me nervous too.”

Lucas frowned, confused. “I do?”

Eliott nodded. “Yeah.”

Lucas wasn’t sure what that meant, and he didn’t think to ask, staring up at Eliott, his eyes soft as Lucas met them.

Eliott licked his lips, as though maybe he was nervous right now, and Lucas saw him swallow, much the same way he’d done that morning when faced with Eliott’s smile. 

“I get nervous when I see you,” Eliott said, voice quiet even in the empty room. “I get nervous when you smile, when you roll your eyes at Basile, when Imane is driving you crazy with schoolwork.”

Lucas frowned despite himself, shaking his head. “I don’t get it.”

“It’s not really nerves,” Eliott said finally, and he was too close now, as if somehow he had inched into Lucas’ space without him noticing, the toes of their shoes almost touching. “It’s more like… butterflies.”

Lucas knew what he was talking about. Knew exactly what Eliott meant. It was how he felt right now, as if the butterflies in his stomach were about to burst out his mouth and scatter all over the room. It was his heart thudding against his ribcage, scared and excited.

But it couldn’t be happening, a tiny voice in the back of his mind said, despite Eliott leaning closer, despite the space between their lips shrinking. His heart hammered in his chest, blood rushing through his ears, and he wondered if he might pass out.

He didn’t pass out. Instead, he took a sharp breath the second before Eliott’s lips pressed to his, careful and slow, and Lucas knew he’d never felt this way about a girl before. He’d never cared about a kiss so much as this one with Eliott.

Eliott’s lips were as soft as he’d expected, a gentle pressure against his, not pushing too far too fast, as though waiting for Lucas to make a decision. Lucas had made his decision weeks ago, the first time he’d seen Eliott, before he’d even known there was a decision to make.

Raising his hand, Lucas let it rest on the back of Eliott’s neck, keeping him there for a moment as he kissed him back, moving up onto his toes to lessen the gap between them, kissing Elliot a little harder, a little more purposeful. All he could feel was elation running through him, the tingle on his skin when Eliott’s hands slid to his waist, the slick slide of Eliott’s tongue in his mouth, heat in his cheeks as his whole body reacted to the fact that he was kissing Eliott. He was kissing the guy he’d only dreamed about for weeks.

For a moment, Lucas didn’t care about his friends or what they might think if they found out. He didn’t care that he’d spent the last few weeks trying to figure out how to talk to Eliott without sounding like an idiot. It didn’t matter now.

Time seemed to stop, just for a second, when Eliott moved back, breaking the kiss, still hovering close enough that Lucas could feel his breath against his lips, and he took a second before opening his eyes, afraid to break the spell falling around them.

“I want to talk to you,” Eliott said, quiet, gripping Lucas’ jacket, almost whispering the words into the space between them. Just for Lucas. “I want to get to know you. I want to be friends with you.”

Lucas shook his head, watching the confusion grow in Eliott’s eyes. “I want to be more than friends,” he said instead, biting back the anxiety rising as he did, scared again. He couldn’t believe he said that, but he was relieved to see Eliott’s smile, as bright and brilliant as always as it reappeared on his face.

The past few weeks seemed to fall away as Eliott leaned into him, forehead pressed to Lucas’, a quick nuzzle to his cheek. Maybe they’d both been thinking the same thing, Lucas thought as they stood there in the empty classroom, Eliott’s hands anchored in his jacket, Lucas’ tentative on Eliott’s waist. They’d both been confused and unsure about the other. The only difference was that Eliott had been able to speak at least.

“I want that too,” Eliott said after a minute, eyes bright as he grinned, and Lucas smiled the same, almost embarrassed at how stupid he’d been.

The sound of the door opening broke them apart, Lucas jumping back as Daphné and Emma entered the room, looking surprised to find them there. Eliott flashed them a smile, much cooler than Lucas.

“Hey,” he greeted them, and Lucas hoped his cheeks weren’t completely flushed from almost getting caught.

“It’s great you guys are using the foyer!” Daphné said excitedly as she greeted them.

Lucas glanced at Eliott, unable to stop his smile as Eliott nodded. “Yeah, we were actually just leaving,” he said instead, feeling much more confident than he had in weeks, especially when Eliott caught his eye. “Come on, Eliott.”

Eliott grabbed his bag off the floor and joined Lucas as they left the classroom. As they walked, Eliott bumped his shoulder, gently, grinning when Lucas looked at him.

“I knew you knew my name.”

Lucas paused, goosebumps crawling up his arm as Eliott’s fingers brushed against his, light and careful in the hall. “What made you think I didn’t?” he asked, smirking a little as Eliott laughed.

He might not have been the smoothest when it came to guys, but at least he knew one thing: that Eliott liked him back, and maybe now, things would get better. Maybe now, things would be okay.

*

FIN.


End file.
